Why did Ethiopians escape Colonialism
Why did Ethiopians managed to defeat foreign encroachment and give any six (6) reasons for the success of Ethiopia.
Ethiopia resistance was a type of African resistance against the establishment of colonial rule in Ethiopia. Menelik II led the resistance from 1986 over the Italians.
The Ethiopian leader was able to unite his people by encouraging strong unity and solidarity so as to fight against the Italian in order to preserve their culture and protect their trading interest.
They aimed at promoting social political and economic development of their country.
The following are the central arguments as to why Ethiopians managed to defeat foreign encroachment and access their resistance;
The geographical advantage. This factors influenced greatly to the success of Ethiopian resistance since the country consists of mountainous great valleys, semi desert which hindered penetration of Italians.
The existence of strong unity and solidarity motivated the success of Ethiopian resistance since it enables them to have the common goal to fight against the Italians. The strong unity and solidarity was influenced by the spread of Christian religion to many Ethiopians hence, they were able to fight against the Italians.
The emergence of strong and outstanding leadership of Menelik II. The presence of strong leadership motivated the success of Ethiopian’s resistance since he was able to encourage strong unity and solidarity also he could encourage the people to fight against the Italians. He was also able to organize his people on their way to fight the Italians.
The existence of strong standing army, which contributed to the success of Ethiopian resistance since it, managed to defeat the Italian’s army.
Italy was still poor and weak nations, this factor motivated the success of Ethiopians resistance since they were not capable to fight against the Ethiopians because of being economically weak. This in turn made them to have poor organization to defeat the Africans.
Menelik II adopted military weapons and fighting tactics from other European nations such as Britain, Russia and Portugal who in turn encouraged and motivated the Ethiopians to fight against the Italians.
Generally, it may be concluded that, although Ethiopians were succeeded to defeat the Italians encroachment still they were badly affected by the war taking into account that they faced economic stagnation, death, massive destruction of social and physical infrastructure like roads and health services.
